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Farrell Ramsey Serving others as a deputy and chaplain

Farrell Ramsey is both a law enforcement officer and a chaplain with the Elmore County Sheriff's Office. He leads a “cop church” every Sunday at his home. (Photo by Gaye Bunderson)

By Gaye Bunderson

First responders frequently see the worst of life: car wrecks, suicides, human cruelty. It can affect them at a deep level. Farrell Ramsey is there to make sure they can cope and carry on, with both their careers and their lives. He is a source of warmth in an otherwise frequently cold profession.

Ramsey is a certified law enforcement officer and chaplain with the Elmore County Sheriff's Office. Originally born and raised in North Carolina, his father was pastor at Pleasant Valley Baptist Church in Mars Hill. Ramsey met his wife Janet there — he was 6 and she was 5.

“She's my childhood sweetheart,” he said.

Ramsey followed his father into the ministry, and in the 1990s, when residents of the Pine-Featherville area wanted to start a church in the community and needed a pastor, he took the job. He was married to Janet by then, and two of the couple's children came with them, while their oldest child remained behind in North Carolina.

Ramsey was trained in logging and tree-trimming and worked for the Forest Service as projects came up. He and Janet held church in their house on Sunday and homeschooled their two children on weekdays. The small, home-based church was called Boise River Baptist. There was a one-room schoolhouse in Pine at the time, and the teacher there attended church at the Ramsey home and helped them out with homeschooling.

Ramsey also joined the Pine volunteer EMTs, which led to his becoming a part of the area search and rescue team.

In 1997, Robbin Ellis, then the resident deputy in Pine, needed a reserve deputy and asked Ramsey if he'd fill in. Back then, it was only a part-time volunteer position, but Ramsey stepped up to help Ellis out.

In 2002, he became a full-time deputy “in the hills,” as he refers to the Pine-Featherville area, and continued to pastor the church. He eventually studied at POST, or Police Officers' Standards and Training, in Meridian; in 2007, he started working as a patrol deputy at the sheriff's office in Mountain Home, leaving the hills and taking a job in the 'city.'

“It was pretty quiet when I left up there, but it was getting really busy,” he said, attributing the increase to a heavy influx of tourists.

The church he started remained in Pine and is now known as Mountain View Community Church; Ramsey and his wife brought Boise River Ministries down to Mountain Home. Now 62, Ramsey decided to continue his dual careers in law enforcement and ministry after newly elected Elmore County Sheriff Mike Hollinshead asked him about working as a deputy sheriff-chaplain.

“The two jobs are more similar than you'd think,” Ramsey said. “I love what I do; it's the best job in the world.”

He holds a “cop church” in his Mountain Home house.

“Cops fall between the cracks in church services,” he said.

He explained there are several reasons for this, including: they work odd hours; they carry pagers that may go off during a service; and they tend to have strong personalities. All that makes Ramsey's church perfect for them.

“We can work with their weird schedules, and pagers can go off — even mine,” he said.

As for their so-called strong personalities, Ramsey has nothing but admiration for anyone in the first line of defense when danger arises.

“They're a special breed, and I love them,” he said. “They can't be thin-skinned. They're under extreme stress.”

When he is called out to any sort of crime scene, whether a DUI crash or a homicide, he is also there for crime victims; but, he said, “My first concern is for deputies. Cops are different. They can't come apart at the scene. You have to be a rock.”

He wants to help the people who have to be strong for others' sake.

“They need to deal with the stress or they're going to come apart,” he said.

Out on the street, officers may project an in-control persona, but when they speak to Ramsey in his capacity as chaplain, nothing is off the table.

“As first responders, they have to be objective and thorough, but the emotions are there. I want to be their safety valve. They have to be okay on the scene, but when they come into my office and we close that door, what is said in the office, stays in the office,” Ramsey said.

Even in smaller communities such as Mountain Home these days, heinous crimes are sometimes committed.

“There is no 'Mayberry R.F.D.' anymore,” he said.

The sheriff is fully behind Ramsey's work.

“What Farrell does is very valuable to this agency. He brings an avenue to officers that deal with stress and emotional issues. He gives them an open door that they can go in and deal with it,” Hollinshead said. “He goes to their house and talks to them and helps them start the healingprocess. It helps them deal with the emotions of our day-to-day job that we deal with, the visuals, the things we see.”

Did Ramsey originally picture himself in the role he's now been cast in?

“I'd like to say I planned this cop church,” he said, “but it just happened. It fell into my lap. I believe God designs us for what he wants us to do.”

He admits he deals with the same potential for burnout as any other person in law enforcement, despite the “chaplain” in his title. He said he copes by being a fitness buff and by living with his best friend.

“My wife is my No. 1 go-to person,” he said.

She is involved with outreach as well.

“She counsels with some of the ladies. She's instrumental in working with cops' spouses,” Ramsey said.

He asserts that, despite everything, studies still show the primary reason people choose to work in law enforcement is to help other people. In that way he's right: being a deputy and a chaplain aren't as different as you'd think.